


hot chocolate

by birdjay



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Don’t copy to another site, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hot Chocolate, M/M, Protective Steve Rogers, Tenderness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-10
Updated: 2019-06-10
Packaged: 2020-04-24 08:26:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19169500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdjay/pseuds/birdjay
Summary: The quiet stretches out between them, until all Steve can hear is the low woosh of breath in Bucky’s lungs, and the fan ticking almost silently above them. The nightlight in the corner is giving off just enough of a glow for Steve to see when Bucky scrunches his eyes shut. He shakes himself a little, like he’s mentally giving himself a talking to. Steve aches with the need to do something, but forces himself to stay still.“Do we have hot chocolate?” Bucky asks, after another solid thirty seconds of silence. His eyes are still shut tight, forcing little wrinkles on either side of them.“I think I have stuff somewhere,” Steve answers, quiet. “Want me to make some?”





	hot chocolate

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Горячий шоколад](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19944433) by [fandom_SteveBucky_2019](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandom_SteveBucky_2019/pseuds/fandom_SteveBucky_2019)



> This was born after a very long night of no sleep. I imagine Steve and Bucky have those nights, too.

 

 

 

The words ‘rough night’ didn’t even begin to describe the six hours they’d spent in bed. Bucky had spent exactly one and a half of those asleep, waking with a rough shout around midnight. Steve had gotten even less sleep than that, having stayed up to finish the end of his book. He’d woken up when Bucky had, determined to help him through whatever dream he’d screamed himself awake from.

“It’s alright, Steve, it was just a… a memory,” Bucky says, rubbing a hand over his eyes. Stubble dots his chin in short, sharp spikes. Steve’s intimately familiar with how it feels against his skin -- like sandpaper. He’s gotten used to having rough red patches on the inside of his thighs because of it.

“It’s not alright, Buck,” Steve says immediately, leaning towards him from his side of the bed. “What was the memory? Do you wanna talk about it? Get it out?” He scoots closer, opening himself up for cuddles should Bucky want them. It’s a toss up these days.

Bucky lets his hand drop from his face, and shoots an icy glare towards Steve. “No, Stevie, I really don’t. I’d rather go back to sleep, but that’s not gonna happen.”

Steve flinches minutely, but nods. “Okay. Um,” he says, feeling a little lost. He’s not a therapist. He’s never been trained on how to deal with nightmares about the very real memories that haunt Bucky day and night. Steve’s just been flying by the seat of his pants with all this, just like he does with everything else in his life. Sam’s been a big help, but Sam can only do so much via proxy, and Bucky flat out refuses to meet with him regarding his mental health. If the conversation even seems like its heading in that direction, Bucky disappears and locks himself in the bedroom. “What can I do?”

The quiet stretches out between them, until all Steve can hear is the low woosh of breath in Bucky’s lungs, and the fan ticking almost silently above them. The nightlight in the corner is giving off just enough of a glow for Steve to see when Bucky scrunches his eyes shut. He shakes himself a little, like he’s mentally giving himself a talking to. Steve aches with the need to do _something_ , but forces himself to stay still.

“Do we have hot chocolate?” Bucky asks, after another solid thirty seconds of silence. His eyes are still shut tight, forcing little wrinkles on either side of them.

“I think I have stuff somewhere,” Steve answers, quiet. “Want me to make some?”

Bucky nods, his hair swinging forward with the movement. “Please?”

Steve nods, pausing only to press a kiss to the crown of Bucky’s head, then slips out of the bed. As he steps through the threshold into the hallway, he hears Bucky slump back down into the pillows.

After perusing the contents of his cabinets, Steve manages to scrape together what he needs to make hot chocolate. A small package of unsweetened chocolate, sugar, milk, vanilla, and a slightly dusty package of marshmallows. They won’t be having any of that processed powdered crap pretending to be hot chocolate. No, Steve will make it the way their mothers used to, back when such things were still available before rationing.

Steve sleepily stirs the slowly melting concoction, watching as the brown of the chocolate squares slowly fades into a lighter color. He lowers the heat, careful not to burn it. Once it’s reasonably melted and mixed, he pulls out two mugs and divides the mixture between them. Steve sets the pot back down on the stovetop -- he’ll wash it later, when it isn’t ass o’clock in the morning. Blinking slowly, he presses two huge marshmallows into both mugs, and then takes one in each hand before heading back towards the bedroom.

Bucky’s staring at the wall when he enters, only looking over when the floor under Steve’s feet makes a small noise. He brightens around the eyes when he sees the mugs Steve’s holding. “Marshmallows?” He asks, hopeful.

Steve smiles at him, nodding once. “Two, to be exact. But there’s more, if you want…”

“They the real big ones?” Bucky asks, holding a hand out for his mug. Steve passes it along before clambering up onto the bed again.

“Those are the only kind we have,” Steve answers, with a laugh. “You won’t let me get the mini ones.”

“Mini ones are a waste of time,” Bucky says, throwing a half-hearted smirk towards Steve. He raises his mug to his lips, and after blowing a steady stream of cool air over the top, takes a sip. Steve watches his eyebrows climb up towards his hairline. “This...this tastes like...”

“When we were kids?” Steve helpfully supplies, taking his own careful sip. It’s mostly just _hot_ right now, but as the liquid cools in his mouth, Steve gets the actual taste. It reminds him of being six and sick, and waiting for Bucky to get out of school. It reminds him of his mom leaning over him with red, worried eyes. It reminds him of Bucky leaping on his bed, holding a brand new toy airplane overhead making engine noises with his mouth as he jumps. It reminds him of _home,_ of _safety,_ and love. So much love.

They’d been surrounded by it as children. Steve might have only had his mother when he was at home, but it was never really _just_ them. The Barnes’s adopted them both as easy as breathing. Winnie Barnes had taken one look at their thin, bony frames and yanked them inside for dinner. She kept them fed when all Sarah could scrape together were potatoes and week-old bread. In return, Sarah treated the childhood illnesses and scrapes for all the Barnes kids.

But then they’d both died.

They’d gone from a world with so much love in it, to one that barely remembered their names. Sure, people remembered _Captain America_ , but how many of them could tell you what his real name was? What he looked like under the mask? Where he was from? What’d he done to get the title he had?

No one, or almost no one, remembered Bucky at all. That had hurt the worst, if Steve was being honest.

No one remembered Bucky, but Bucky was all he could remember.

Steve drags himself out of his memories. This isn’t about him right now. Bucky’s the one with the immediate trauma. Bucky’s the one who needs his attention.

“Yeah,” Bucky answers, eyes wide. He takes another drink, a much longer one this time, and then rests the mug on his upturned knee.

Steve watches him for a moment, wishing that he could just _heal_ him. It’s a horrible thing to think, he knows. There’s a process to healing, it can’t be done overnight with a wave of a magic wand. Bucky _is_ getting better, but no matter what Shuri did in Wakanda, there’s still more to be done. The triggers might be gone, but the memories are not. There will be nights like this for the rest of their lives. Maybe not every other day like now, or once a week, or even once a month. These nights will come, but they’ll get through them.

The sun will always rise.

“Do you remember --” Bucky starts, frowning at the red enamel of his mug. “Do you remember when you were sick… and I…”

Steve sits quietly, sipping at his hot chocolate, waiting for Bucky to parse out exactly what memory he’s recalling. Sometimes it takes a few moments for him to pull all the threads together into something cohesive. Sometimes the memory never becomes solid, staying smoke that whisps through his fingers.

Bucky’s face scrunches as he thinks a little harder. There’s another quiet moment, and then Bucky finally finishes the sentence he started. “And I brought you that bag of candy?”

Steve makes a noise in the back of his throat -- he _does_ remember that. But it happened a lot, Bucky spoiling him, so he’s not entirely sure which particular instance that he’s referring to. “Which time?” Steve asks, softly. He sips at his chocolate, sad to see that he’s nearing the end of it.

Bucky looks up at him, blinking. “When you had pneumonia. We were...eight? Nine?” He pauses, and chews on his lip for a moment. “The year we didn’t have fall -- it just went right to winter after summer. Bad weather, that was why you got sick…”

Steve nods slowly. “Yeah, I remember. Doc was surprised I got better.” It had been a bad fall for him. Most autumns were, but that one had been particularly awful. He’d come down with bronchitis, which had very quickly turned into full-blown pneumonia. His mom hadn’t been able to get it under control by herself, so they’d had to rely on doctors and prescriptions they could just barely afford. Steve distinctly remembers overhearing one of them tell her to make arrangements, that her son was on his way out of this world. Sarah had stubbornly refused.

A quick flash of surprise covers Bucky’s face before he schools it back to blankness. “I didn’t know that.”

Steve nods, shrugs. “They thought I was a goner a lot. You know that. Or… I guess you _did_ know that. But I’m here, aren’t I? Thanks to Erskine, I’m here.”

Bucky rolls his eyes, but laughs. Steve knows very well how little Bucky thinks of Erskine and the process it took to get Steve his Captain America body. If Bucky had been around, he’d have dragged Steve away from the SSR by his ear. Thank God Bucky hadn’t been around.

“But yeah, Buck. Yeah, I remember that.”

Bucky shifts, leaning into Steve’s space. They’re not touching, not quite yet. Quiet takes over for another moment or two. After Bucky swallows a huge mouthful of hot chocolate, he says, “D’you know I stole that candy?”

Surprise flits down Steve’s spine. “You stole it?” It’s not entirely new prospect to him -- they were so goddamn poor for a while that Bucky frequently gave them the five-finger discount at drug stores. He’d walk out of one with his pockets full of pencils, drugs, various candies and whatever else he could get away with. He’d never been caught, and despite Steve yelling himself hoarse once they got home, Bucky never quit.

“Yeah,” Bucky admits, with half a shrug. “I wanted to bring you somethin’ nice, and I’d already spent my pocket money that week.

“Buck, if I remember right, that was _a lot_ of candy.”

Bucky shrugs again, this time for real. A smile lights up his face. “Yeah, it was. I had Becca distract the counter-guy. I filled it up as best I could and shoved it deep into my jacket so he couldn’t tell I had it.”

“You enlisted Becca to help you with your crimes?!” Steve says, mildly outraged. He’d loved all the Barnes girls like sisters. Becca particularly. She had never put up with either of them for very long before rolling her eyes and walking out of the room. But she _had_ let him draw her on multiple occasions. Always dressed, and always classy, but it had helped him figure out the female form.

“Steve. I was eight, she was six. We were stealing candy, not committing treason,” Bucky says, with the air of a long-suffering parent. “And it happened over eighty years ago. I think the statute of limitations has long since passed.”Steve lets out a huge chestful of air, and breaks into laughter. “Yeah, alright.” He drains his mug, and sets it on the bedside table. “You at least give her some?”

Bucky glares at him through his curtain of hair. “Of course. What do you take me for?”

Steve laughs again, and slowly slides himself down so he’s laying flat on the mattress. He reaches out and dances his fingertips over Bucky’s bare knee. Bucky closes his metal hand over Steve’s, just holding it steady.

“You want more?” Steve asks, nodding towards the mug in Bucky’s other hand.

“Nah. This...this was good,” he answers, finishing the last dregs of his chocolate in one long swallow. He sets it aside, and squashes himself beside Steve. He arranges his many, many pillows for a few minutes, taking care to get them exactly where he wants them before laying back down properly.

The air in the bedroom is cool, but not cold. Bucky tugs the blankets up over them both, tucking himself into Steve’s side with one well-judged scoot. Steve quickly wraps an arm around his middle, holding him tight against himself. It’s what Bucky’s asking for without words.

“Gonna try to go back to sleep now?” Steve asks, lowering his face into Bucky’s hair. It smells clean, and faintly of fruit. That’s got to be the overly expensive shampoo he insists on buying every month. Steve will never admit it, but he loves the way it smells, and the way it makes Bucky’s hair shine in the sun.

“Mmm. Maybe,” Bucky says, soft. Steve can tell just by listening to him that he’s already close to drifting off. His breathing has gone deep and even. If Steve manages to shut up for a bit, Bucky’s going to slip right back under to what will hopefully be dreamless sleep. He wiggles just a little, getting to that final stage of comfortable.

“Sleep as long as you can, alright?” Steve whispers on a breath. “We don’t have anywhere we need to be tomorrow.”

“Mhm,” Bucky mumbles, squashing his face into a pillow. He goes still after that, sleep having taken him.

Steve stays awake a little longer, just holding Bucky close. He’s a little scared that Bucky will wake with another rough scream. If he stays awake, stays vigilant, maybe that won’t happen. His mind drifts as he watches Bucky’s profile, thoughts bouncing from memory to memory. They’ve lived so long without each other, those years apart feeling like huge holes in himself.

He’s not sure what their future holds, what they’ll do with the rest of the time they’ve been graciously given. It doesn’t really matter, though, as long as they’re together. They could do anything, go anywhere.

The world is theirs, if they want it.

  


 

 


End file.
